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UCT staff decry ‘callous’ executive for awarding themselves bonuses

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Friday, 11 August 2017 12:24

Cape Times reports that University of Cape Town (UCT) unions and lecturers have reacted with outrage to the R2.8 million in performance bonuses that the university’s top management paid themselves for 2016, which was almost double the R1.5m of 2015.

The Employees Union (EU) noted this was in circumstances where about 280 staff left UCT due to the university implementing austerity measures, through retrenchment, incentivised early retirement (IER) or voluntary separation package (VSP). According to the union, they have been left demoralised by the “callousness” of the university’s actions and there was “no justification for demanding that ordinary workers ‘tighten their belts’ while the executive stuff their pockets”. The university, however, denied this, with spokesperson Elijah Moholola indicating that the austerity project was part of an exercise to ensure the financial sustainability of UCT by giving an opportunity to employees who wished to leave to do so by accepting voluntary incentivised separation packages. Apparently no employee was made redundant where savings targets were not met.